The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1887-05-26

81 sass ss S.
him. Now he sat by the fireside there,
in the deep chair, reading, now he was
busy with maps and pictures at the
table; now, in the big bay, the moon
light, that had pale green refiexions in
it cast up from tho emerald depths of
the woods below, fell about him.
I dare say that, in reality, busy
about the place and his affairs of one
sort or another, and doing his best
to live and to forget, he was very little
in that room; but there l chose to
place him; and it grew strangely sweet
to me, and every moment when I
could sit down alone my fancy took
me nnd sat down in that room, or
else l wandered up and down the
great staircase and the hall where his
peoples portraits hung; but always
came back again to the hearth of the
long dim room if it were day, to the
dancing fire-cast shadows there II it
were night, and the place grew dearer
and dearer to me every hour, and l :
upbraided myself in thoughts too Bit
ter for speech for the folly and angry
temper that had shut me out of it,
that had drawn comparison between
that ancient lofty place and this low
and tiresome stretch, of, nothing but
common grass lands, between that
manor and this plain farmhouse, al.
though in real truth my farmhouse;
was quite it's equal at any other time.
But tie new year came in without
sign from Mark or a sign from me;
and the country was white with snow,
| and the river ice was strong enough to
bear up sledges and teams Of horses,
and the iceboats were splitting the
wind before them. It al made no
odds to me. was completely wretch
ed. didn't pretend to go to- church
if the Sawyers and Wellses came to
me, l. suppose treated them prop
erly-rm sure I don't know-but I
never set my foot outdoors the win
ter long.
There were furious storms that win
ter. The snow fell as / never remcm-
Tered it before. The drifts seemed ia
wall us y from all the world. "A liv-
ing toni, II used to murmer. "1wish
1t were a tomb indeed, and 1 in my
last Sleep" At twenty. one can be so
very miserable; and at thirty, if one
lives SO long, one can be 50 profane
as to laugh at It,
..somstimes. Bryan and Thomas
brought word OF the outside regions,
OF the way people up-river were sleigh
riding over the tops of fences, of the
immense snowfall in the mountains,
and the fears of what would happen
from it in the spring if there should be
an early thaw. And t remembered
some words that Mark used to quote
from a. play he had seen, when this
snow melteth there shs,lc:5. HE & food"
l didn't cSre how many floods came.
And so, with storm after storm, the
winter wore away, Jane and Maria ct
their housekeeping tasks, and busy
with my tugmaking, hooking strips Of
Woollen cloth through coffee.bags, not
because the house was not full of
them, but because | had nothing Bet
ter to do. For 1 couldn't read; if
tried my eyes swan, and I could not
make out word of what it was all
about. And people went and came
like shadows; and the days had grown
short, and now they grew long, and
what did 1t all matter to me?
| March had come, but without a sign
OF the winters breaking; and then at
last April ,loitefed on. and April suns
began to do their work; and gradually
the drifts Of SNOW in the lanes and il,
fields began I'd settle, and to lessen
and melt and disappear. And Bryan
end Thomas had to talk of the brood.
ing hens, and watch for the breaking
up of the river, and discuss the chance
of the early rye and the new calves
and the hiring of the spring hands;
and it was all emptiness. And one
day it began to snow, and the snow
turned to rain, and it rained that day
and rained in rivers, and it rained the
next day,and it rained till it had rain
ed a week-a long, dreary week that
babe fair to end only in deluge. And
on Saturday the sun came out warm;
and when 1 looked; the cfocuses
bloonled Under the windows, and
Thomas said it was very like the May.
flowers were opened in the woods, if
anybody could get to them for the
roads all being under water, although
the river was still locked in solid ice
from shore to shore. And in the late
afternoon of the second day of this
same sweet sunshine and south wind,
as we sat there, Jane and I, Maria
ran IN and said there was water in the
cellar, as much as six inches.
'"That is nothing" said I. ~ should
think there would be, after such a
melting OF snow and such a raining of
torrents"
otis more likely it's the land suck
ing up the river, miss, said Maria.
1.-The rivers just raging full under its
lc ecoat, shouldn't wonder, and is
letting itself out through the land"
And as she spoke there came a great
shock and thrill, a rumble, g. roar,
and a mighty burst of sound.
"Great mercy, miss! cried Jane,
cts the ice cracking and rending from
shore to shore. l never heard the like
before, many springs as I've lived be-
side it." And before she had done
speaking the sound came again-the
sound OF great guns, the trembling of
an earthquake.
ut is an earthquake" said 1. ut
must be. But earthquakes up here
don't amount to anything"
"That's no earthquake, cried Jane.
And then we sat there an hour or
more, looking out on the river, and
listening to the sounds, and wonder
ing, and telling stories ofearthquakes,
and harlships, and what not, curd-
ling our blood as we talked. And at
last Thomas came in; he had been
down the lane to the highway, and q
person who had come from up coun-
try had told him that the freshet was
on the river, and the high water had
carried away Ford's mills, dozen
miles above us.
"But how can it do that?" said 1.
GLOW can there be freshet where it's
all ice?"
:'Just because it is all ice, MISS"
said Thomas. 1.-THE streams are full